


Roots

by anathemafen



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Drabble, F/M, Light Angst, Poor Clueless Lavellan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-07
Updated: 2018-04-07
Packaged: 2019-04-19 11:41:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14236521
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anathemafen/pseuds/anathemafen
Summary: Lavellan just wants Solas to be happy.





	Roots

There was a fierce intelligence behind Solas’ eyes, depths of knowledge she wanted to dip into and drink from. 

But there was something else too.

At first she had taken it for condescension, a notion only supported by his clear distaste for the Dalish. His hard judgement born out of what she thought his ignorance had been delivered with barely concealed disdain, words whip-like in their sharpness. Lavellan had only _just_ kept from flinching, though she was sure it was written on her face: shock, anger, hurt.

Determination.

His eyes had flickered then, condescension giving way to something else, the blaze of his pride dimming just a moment, but a moment long enough for her to see it.

An unfathomable melancholy. A profound loneliness. A yearning that dampened the sting of his words.

Lavellan stayed her hand from reaching out, clenched it when he blinked and his eyes regarded her with a cold detachment, pride and wisdom resettling like sentinels – and she wondered whether they were there to keep her out or to keep _that_ in.

But if distance had been his wish, Lavellan would not be the one to grant it.

She had always been a curious creature, steadfast when she was presented with an unknown. Some had viewed it as a flaw. 

_Too distracted, too nosy, too stubborn._

Solas, curiously, did not. He answered each question with genuine consideration, mulling over her inquiry before responding with an earnest answer. And she noticed how he always had a small quirk to his lips when his silvery voice began to paint pictures of the many wonders he had come across. 

So, slowly she began battering down the walls he had built up, strong and resolute, but not as strong as her obstinacy and not so resolute that they would hold up against her indomitable focus.

His face began to soften when she came bounding back with new queries, a billion little curiosities that filled her up and kept her going.

But there was one question she wished to ask more than any other. 

It was beyond words, beyond the capacity to be formed into a cohesive sentence, beyond even her tenacity to try and shape them and push them past her lips. And so she wondered.

She wondered how deep his loneliness went – had it pervaded so far as to grow roots, melancholic tendrils that twined around just his being? Or was it his soul too? And if she were to prod them, to reach down, to grab ahold of and _pull_ would they come out? If she were to deprive them of water, would they wither and fall away? Would new ones grow in their place, and if so, could she help shape them to hold and not harm?

Lavellan posed the question in the form of a kiss, an impulsive thing that made her question when her wonder had become want.

Solas’ answer was an insistent tug that had her pulled back into his arms, a deepening of the kiss and a glimpse into his eyes. A true glimpse now, unfettered by whatever reservations he’d had before, armour shed and soul bared.

And it hurt.

Lavellan’s heart ached at the depths of sorrow, pools that she wanted to dip into and absorb, empty, refill.

But then Solas looked at her again, and there was something else too.

Slowly, a root began to give away.


End file.
